Tuesday, December 22, 2015

A Congressional Overture to Censorship

Stephen Coughlin alerted
me to a House Resolution introduced on December 17th, H.Res.569,
“Condemning violence, bigotry, and hateful rhetoric towards Muslims in the
United States.114th Congress (2015-2016).”As of this writing, the country remains clueless about this development.

The
resolution was introduced by Virginia Democrat Donald S. Beyer,
and sponsored by Frank
Pallone, a New Jersey Democrat, and endorsed by seventy-one other Representatives,
most of them Democrats, and possibly a sprinkling of Republicans. The
resolution has gone into committee, but one can predict with confidence that it
will emerge virtually unscathed and unaltered. After all, the “victims” are Muslims,
and the House wishes to put it in the record that certain of its members are
against hurting anyone’s feelings.

Many of the
usual suspects have endorsed the resolution: Keith Ellison,
a Democrat and Muslim from Minnesota; Debbie
Wasserman Schultz, Florida Democrat and chairman of the Democratic National
Committee; Charles
Rangel, New York Democrat; and Alan Grayson, a Democrat
from Florida. Most of the other endorsers’ names I do not recognize. They are
all termites who have made careers of eating away at the rule of law and
“transforming” America from a Western nation into a multicultural,
welfare-statist, politically correct stewpot of no particular character.

Resolutions
of this nature have a tendency to be reintroduced later as binding legislation
to be forwarded to the Senate. The introduction of this resolution is not yet
newsworthy, but it will be if it emerges intact from committee to be voted on
by the whole House. One suspects that H.Res.569 was inspired by U.S. Attorney General Loretta Lynch’s promise to an
audience of Muslim
Advocates on December 3rd that she would spend efforts to combat and
prosecute anyone guilty of anti-Muslim speech. I do not think the two-week gap
between Lynch’s pronouncements and the introduction of the resolution is
coincidental. It probably took two weeks to compose and fine-tune its wording.

Interestingly,
the term “Islamophobia” does not occur in the resolution text. That may or may
not have been oversight on the part of the resolution’s backers. But Coughlin,
in Parts IV through VI in Catastrophic
Failure, reveals in detail the Muslim Brotherhood’s and the Organization of Islamic Cooperation’s (OIC)
mutual and complementary obsession with having Islamophobia quashed and
prohibited on pain of penalty, worldwide, but especially in the U.S.

Nevertheless, as Coughlin explains in great
detail in his book, the language of the House resolution mirrors the
OIC’s Islamophobia narrative being implemented domestically. See my reviews of Coughlin’s
book here.

House Homeland Security Committee chairman Rep. Michael McCaul (R-TX) was photographed with—and
wrote a personal note in silver sharpie to—an Islamic leader who said
practicing Muslims in the United States are “above the law of the land.”

On May 13, 2013, McCaul held an open house
at a district office in Katy, Texas. While McCaul’s
Facebook posting announcing the open house said an RSVP was required, a
spokeswoman for McCaul told Breitbart News that Council on American Islamic
Relations (CAIR) Houston branch executive director Mustafa Carroll showed up
without notice.

During the open house, McCaul and Carroll
were photographed speaking to one another. On top of the photograph, in silver
sharpie, McCaul wrote to Carroll: “To Mustafa and the Council on American
Islamic Relations, the moderate Muslim is our most effective weapon—Michael McCaul, TX-10.” (Italics mine)

In parsing
this resolution, let’s first examine all the Whereas’s first:

Whereas
the victims of anti-Muslim hate crimes and rhetoric have faced physical,
verbal, and emotional abuse because they were Muslim or believed to be Muslim;

I think I can count the victims of anti-Muslim hate
crimes committed in the U.S. on the fingers of one hand; I don’t immediately
recall any Muslim of either gender in the U.S. of being physically assaulted as
Europeans are
now being attacked and raped
by Muslim gangs of immigrants and “refugees.” I do not think the scarcity of reports
of anti-Muslim hate crimes is due to the news media’s oversight; there is just
a paucity of such crimes, unless one counts publically burning a Koran or hanging a side of bacon on the
front door of a mosque. But one can be sure that when one occurs, the news
media will be all over it like raspberry jam on a muffin. As for “verbal abuse,” that’s covered in the criminal
code, so a House resolution on the subject is redundant. Does the code
really need another superfluous category that pertains only to Muslims? Is Congress
now turning to maintaining the emotional health and welfare of Muslims? It
seems so. There is the nanny state, complemented by the nursemaid state.

Whereas
the constitutional right to freedom of religious practice is a cherished United
States value and violence or hate speech towards any United States community
based on faith is in contravention of the Nation’s founding principles;

Note
how “violence” and “hate speech” are paired together, as though they were
synonymous offenses, which they are not. “Hate speech,” which I have argued for
years is an illegitimate concept (prosecute the demonstrable crime, not the contents
of a person’s mind), has no metaphysical power to physically harm anyone. For
words to be capable of actually harming anyone, they would need to “spoken” by
a kind of paintball gun rigged to replicate the sound of an insult as a mass of
air that could knock a person flat on his tosh. Words on paper, words
transmitted through the air, are not tangible weapons. Further, “hate speech”
is not in “contravention” to the nation’s founding principles. It hadn’t been
invented yet, and, it being an illegitimate category of crime, it is not to be
confused with genuine slander or libel. Those offenses our Founding Fathers
knew something about, most of them having been lawyers schooled in British law.

Whereas
there are millions of Muslims in the United States, a community made up of many
diverse beliefs and cultures, and both immigrants and native-born citizens;

And?
So what? Those millions of Muslims and their mosques expect to be deferred to
and accommodated because their “faith” requires it. No mention anywhere in the
resolution of the practice of female genital mutilations, honor killings,
beheadings, arranged marriages that often send a girl or woman to Pakistan or
some other Sharia-governed country, and sermons advocating jihad and not cooperating with the authorities when the latter are
investigating genuine “hate crimes,” such as the Boston Marathon bombing and
the San Bernardino massacre by….Muslims. No mention of Muslims bringing into
this country their age-old sectarian animosities between Muslims, no mention
either of their “cultural” hatred and contempt for Western liberties, so often
articulated by Muslim spokesmen.

Whereas
this Muslim community is recognized as having made innumerable contributions to
the cultural and economic fabric and well-being of United States society;

“Innumerable
contributions”? Which ones? I can’t think of any advances in medicine, science,
literature, or any of the other arts that Muslims have contributed to American
society. In terms of an economic contribution, I can think of a spike in gun
sales to Americans who, for some strange reason, wish to arm themselves against
Islamic depredations. I can see, too, how the presence of millions of Muslims
is tearing the fabric of our Western society, because their “culture” is alien
and hostile to everything America stands for. Again, in terms of economics,
there are the millions of Muslims who have gravitated toward the welfare state
and working as little as possible, if ever. Most American Muslims are here for
the same reason millions of Muslims want to settle and colonize Germany,
Britain, Sweden, and other European welfare states.

Whereas
hateful and intolerant acts against Muslims are contrary to the United States
values of acceptance, welcoming, and fellowship with those of all faiths,
beliefs, and cultures;

Come
again? Where do we see that “welcoming and fellowship” of Muslims with Jews?
With Christians? Except in some bogus “outreach” program or in interfaith
“dialogue”? There is a word that covers the act of a Muslim willing to talk
civilly with Jews and Christians: hudna,
or a temporary truce that Muslims are willing to endure to buy time or gain the
trust of infidels. The Koran,
however, specifically prohibits Muslims from being friends with infidels or
treating them as equals. Any “friendship” or “dialogue” that occurs between
Muslims and infidels is simply the practice of dawah, or attempts to persuade infidels to convert to Islam. Effusive protestations of “friendship” with
non-Muslims are but practiced taqiyya.

YUSUFALI: O ye who believe!
Take not into your intimacy those outside your ranks: They will not fail to
corrupt you. They only desire your ruin: Rank hatred has already appeared from
their mouths: What their hearts conceal is far worse. We have made plain to you
the Signs, if ye have wisdom.

PICKTHAL: O ye who believe! Take not
for intimates others than your own folk, who would spare no pains to ruin you;
they love to hamper you. Hatred is revealed by (the utterance of) their mouths,
but that which their breasts hide is greater. We have made plain for you the
revelations if ye will understand.

SHAKIR: O you who believe!
do not take for intimate friends from among others than your own people; they
do not fall short of inflicting loss upon you; they love what distresses you;
vehement hatred has already appeared from out of their mouths, and what their
breasts conceal is greater still; indeed, We have made the communications clear
to you, if you will understand.

Point made. There is much more where that came
from. Raymond Ibrahim, for example, has an excellent post on the role of taqiyya and false friendships, “Islam’s
Doctrines of Deception.” Or absorb Stephen Coughlin’s section on
“Interfaith Outreach” in Catastrophic
Failure.

Whereas
these acts affect not only the individual victims but also their families,
communities, and the entire group whose faith or beliefs were the motivation
for the act;

So,
we mustn’t consider the individual victims of Islamic terrorism, nor their
families and friends. Only alleged Muslim victims and their families, and
communities, and the whole Islamic ummah
can claim victimhood. Non-Muslim victims of Islamic terrorism are simply
blanked-out when Muslim victimhood is making the rounds in Washington,
D.C.See the CNS report on the number of
anti-Muslim “hate crimes” here.

According to the FBI’s
Uniform Crime Reports: Hate Crime Statistics, 2014, there were 1,140
victims of anti-religious hate crimes in the U.S. in 2014. “Of the 1,140
victims of anti-religious hate crimes: 56.8 percent [56.8%] were victims of
crimes motivated by their offenders’ anti-Jewish bias.” That amounts to
approximately 647.52 instances where Jewish individuals, businesses or
institutions were targeted. A mere “16.1 percent [16.1%] were victims of
anti-Islamic (Muslim) bias,” amounting to approximately 183.54 instances where
Muslim individuals, businesses or institutions were targeted.

Whereas
Muslim women who wear hijabs, headscarves, or other religious articles of
clothing have been disproportionately targeted because of their religious
clothing, articles, or observances; and

If
they have been disproportionately “targeted” for “discrimination” it is because
such garb is 1) required of Muslim women, otherwise they are beaten or
assaulted or honor-killed by other Muslims; and 2) because women are regarded
in Islam as second-class human beings, as chattel.Muslim women who wear the full burqa or other
garb that covers their faces are not to be trusted because too many of them
have been suicide bombers.

Whereas
the rise of hateful and anti-Muslim speech, violence, and cultural ignorance
plays into the false narrative spread by terrorist groups of Western hatred of
Islam, and can encourage certain individuals to react in extreme and violent ways:

This
is perhaps the most obtuse and odious “Whereas” in the resolution’s text.
Islamic terrorist groups do not engage in “false narratives”; they mean what
they say and they as a rule quote chapter and verse from the Koran about why they do what they do. Western
“hate speech” does not “play into the hands of terrorists”; we, however, are
putty in their hands because we have adopted the false narrative that the
terrorists have “hijacked” a “peaceful religion” or have a perverted
interpretation of “kill the Jew or Christian if he does not submit or pay jizya.” To wit:

Qur'an
(9:29) - "Fight those who believe not in Allah nor the Last Day,
nor hold that forbidden which hath been forbidden by Allah and His Messenger,
nor acknowledge the religion of Truth, (even if they are) of the People of the
Book, until they pay the Jizya with willing submission, and feel themselves
subdued." Suras 9 and 5 are the last "revelations" that
Muhammad narrated - hence abrogating what came before, including the oft-quoted
verse 2:256 -"There is no compulsion in religion...".

That
is from the horse’s mouth. It can’t be “perverted.”

Now,
therefore, be it

Resolved, That the House of
Representatives—

(1)
expresses its condolences for the victims of anti-Muslim hate crimes;

(2)
steadfastly confirms its dedication to the rights and dignity of all its
citizens of all faiths, beliefs, and cultures;

(3)
denounces in the strongest terms the increase of hate speech, intimidation,
violence, vandalism, arson, and other hate crimes targeted against mosques,
Muslims, or those perceived to be Muslim;

(4)
recognizes that the United States Muslim community has made countless positive
contributions to United States society;

(5)
declares that the civil rights and civil liberties of all United States
citizens, including Muslims in the United States, should be protected and preserved;

(6)
urges local and Federal law enforcement authorities to work to prevent hate
crimes; and to prosecute to the fullest extent of the law those perpetrators of
hate crimes; and

(7)
reaffirms the inalienable right of every citizen to live without fear and
intimidation, and to practice their freedom of faith.

Someone
please tell me that H.Res.569
is not a formal recognition and
application of Sharia law, which also purports to be the “law of the land” in
contravention of the U.S. Constitution being the “law of the land.”

No one can
deny it. No one can say that the resolution does not represent an itch to
legally gag Americans when they try to discuss Islam and the Obama-enabled
invasion of this country by enemy aliens. No one can tell me that this
resolution is not a victory for the Muslim Brotherhood and the OIC.

Doubtless,
the House resolution cannot be declared unconstitutional because it is a mere
opinion expressed by members of the House. It does not carry the force of law. Therefore,
it cannot be enforced or entered into the statutes, provided it survives, as a bill intended to become a law, vetting
by the Senate, and is signed by the President.

To
become the “law of the land.” Barack Obama would not hesitate to sign it.